In a move to reach out to urban young entrepreneurs, a local charity organisation, My Community My Responsibility Organisation (MCMRO) has introduced an enterprise dubbed “The Pass on Initiative”.

The Organisation’s Director Brian Khembo has told YFM Online that through the initiative, young people with vibrant entrepreneurial ideas will be given a collateral free K100, 000 start-up loan to venture into business.

Khembo said: “We aim at giving back to the society and creating resilient communities. Our main target is to alleviate urban poverty and that’s the scope that we target. The initiative aims at giving up startups to young entrepreneurs that are struggling, doing small businesses.

“So, the pass on initiative came out following the initiative that we did on youth empowerment, and entrepreneurship initiative after noticing that most of the youth in the country struggles to find funding.”

According to Khembo, once that particular young person rolls out the business, it is advised that they pay back the loan without any interest and that same K100, 000 will be passed on to another individual and so on.

“We are asking young people to give ideas, what can they do with K100,000 and then we find the best idea and then it has to go to the next person in next month. So, our target is that this programme goes to one best idea in a month.

“Should we be able to produce a little profit and return back the money and pass on to the next, which is the main idea of the initiative, and we are targeting all youth in the country,” he said.

Currently, young people in Lilongwe are encouraged to share their business ideas through the organisation’s Facebook Page where vibrant concepts will be selected.

MCMRO says the next phase of the Initiative will target young people in Mzuzu, Blantyre and Zomba.